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Opinion on Eagle Act, Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and Indians

Posted by David Hardy · 11 May 2008 12:34 PM

Here, in pdf. Altho it construes a statute, it applies a number of constitutional standards. When I was at Interior, I worked with some of these issues. The Eagle Protection Act generally outlaws intentionally killing eagles or using their parts. Certain Indian tribes consider them essential to various religious services. To try to deal with that, Interior puts dead eagles (road kill, mostly) into a repository and rations out feathers, etc.

Problem here was that this tribe maintained that the eagle being offered to the Almighty must be pure, i.e., not road kill. In fact, the stricter adherents maintained the eagle must be captured live by a person. Having seen their claws and beaks, I think I'd contract that job out.

This is the right decision. If you don't like the statute as it is, the correct approach is to lobby the Congress to get the law changed. Indian tribes have lots of political stroke; of course, enviros do, too. Hence, the compromise that is presently in place.

There's your typical government bureaucrats in action. Why not issue eagle licenses for half of what they request, the actual number they probably had in mind. By submitting to a permit process they have effectively thrown away another element of sovereignty.
Maybe they could offer the government agents the chance to participate in some other ancient traditional Indian traditions like dying a slow agonizing death for trespassing on their tribal land.